There are some changes afoot at Archer…

For a bit of background, Archer Magazine was started in 2013 by writer and journalist Amy Middleton. It’s a media platform for intersectional LGBTIQA+ people whose voices are often left out of mainstream conversations.

The platform is going strong, with many awards, dozens of global events, and more than 3 million website views under its belt. Last year, the team successfully launched Archer Studio, an inclusive creative agency, to share their skills and community expertise with clients. 

After 13 years, it’s time for our founder, Amy, along with Archer’s visuals extraordinaire, Alexis Desaulniers-Lea, to hand the reins over to their successors and take a well-earned rest.

Hailey Moroney will manage Archer Studio. Dani Leever will manage Archer’s publications, with support from online editor, Alex Creece. Hailey and Dani have worked on Archer for 10 years apiece. They know the business intimately, and they’re more than ready to continue Archer’s important work.

The Archer website publishes new queer voices every week. Our community is connected. The team is strong, and our future is bright. If you’re reading along, we thank you. Our community is our strongest ally. Times are intense, and we can only do this together. Queer and trans voices matter.

Thanks to Amy and Alexis for their hard work over the years, and thanks to all our readers for being here alongside us.

We love you!

Statement from Amy Middleton

Dear readers,

After nearly 14 years at the helm of Archer, I’ve recently announced that I’ll be wrapping up my role. 

I launched Archer back in 2013, at the exuberant age of 27, because I wanted to start writing about my favourite topics – sexuality, gender and identity – and I saw a lack of inclusive queer media in Australia.

I built a small team of volunteers, including visuals expert, Alexis Desaulniers-Lea, and together we focused on platforming intersectional voices and art in print and online, sharing the perspectives of people who were traditionally either exploited by the media, or invisibilised and left out altogether.

Readers loved the magazine, and seeing their experiences and identities reflected in glossy, high-quality print media. The website has now been viewed more than 3 million times, and the mag has been stocked in dozens of countries across the world.

Before the pandemic we were close to covering costs. But, during COVID, the advertising revenue and arts funding we had come to rely on dried up, and I could no longer afford to bankroll the business. 

At this point, I approached Karen Field, CEO of community services org Drummond Street Services (DSS), and asked whether DSS would consider acquiring the business to keep it afloat. Karen and I had worked together the previous year and found a strong alignment in our work and our values.

Karen and the DSS Board saw the value of Archer as a platform for intersectional voices that are so often ignored or silenced. 

During the acquisition process, I was living regionally, in consecutive lockdowns, managing Archer and parenting a small child. I remember continually pinching myself that the platform might just survive the winter, and I began to fathom just how much I was about to learn and grow from working within a 100-year-old not-for-profit organisation.

DSS gave Archer another life as a supported, yet still wholly independent, platform, at a time when right-wing propaganda was making life increasingly harder for LGBTIQA+ people, here in Australia and globally. They trusted my team’s expertise and creativity wholeheartedly.

Over the past 18 months, DSS supported my harebrained scheme to offer up the team’s skills and expertise to external clients. With their support, we conjured up a new business – Archer Studio, a creative agency with an inclusive focus, bringing in client revenue to offset the cost of the publication.

After a couple of tough years, my nervous system started loudly calling me out for slogging too hard and I had to take extended sick leave. During this time, my team stepped up and showed the incredible amount of talent and expertise they’d developed over the past decade.

In 2026, I returned to work, knowing I needed to make a tough decision. I introduced my team to the idea of a new structure without me at the helm. We chatted about which roles and responsibilities tickled each of them, and built a new team structure, which featured a leaner team, shared leadership, and a new chapter for Archer – the “little magazine that could”.

It became increasingly clear to me that Dani and Hailey, who started at Archer as bright-eyed volunteers a decade ago, had completed their mentorship. They were – and are – more than ready to step up and take the reins. These two, with Alex Creece as online editor, will be Archer’s amazing new core team.

Archer Studio has a slew of clients under its belt, and the Archer website continues to publish new voices every week and develop innovative queer content. 

The future is bright. I’m leaving this little business in safe hands, and, incredibly, on a positive trajectory. 

For all their support over the years, I’d like to send super special thanks to my exceptional team, especially Dani, Hailey and Alex; my off-sider Alexis; Karen, Ali and the DSS Board for seeing the value in what we built, and allowing it to see the light of another day, and everyone who has helped me along the way including mates, partners and family.

I can’t wait to have a little rest while I decide what’s next. 

All my love,

Amy

Statement from Alexis Desaulniers-Lea

Thirteen years ago, I answered an ad for a queer magazine seeking an image curator. A week later, new to Naarm and so-called Australia, I met Amy Middleton at a pub for an interview. We sat by the window with a pint of beer, and she spoke passionately about a dream to make a global print magazine that platformed queer storytellers: a place where artists and writers could tell their stories from inclusive and diverse perspectives across the globe.

As someone who had dreamt of being part of a print magazine one day, who had huge collections of print erotica, editorial fashion campaigns, and visceral portraiture plastered across their bedroom walls since the age of 14, before there was the language to self-identify as pansexual or queer, Amy’s disarming pitch lit a fire in me. I had no idea that single conversation would become a profoundly defining chapter of my life.

What began with makeshift offices, pitching to artists from living room rugs, and a shared goal of platforming lesser-heard voices, became something far beyond anything I could have imagined. Over 13 years and counting, Archer Magazine grew into a global platform for intersectional LGBTIQA+ stories: a beautifully imperfect, fiercely values-driven space built on inclusivity, diversity, and the radical power of collective storytelling both visually and through the written word.

To Amy, thank you for taking a chance on me all those years ago. For your vision, your relentless tenacity despite all odds and obstacles, for all the ways you’ve looked out for this team, and for building something that had never been done before in so-called Australia. It has been the greatest honour to help bring this dream of yours to life with you for over a decade. Experiencing the growing Archer community over the years has been awe-inspiring: an ongoing confirmation of a global need for inclusive and diverse storytelling, reflective of the hard work you’ve put in to make this little mag a reality that has resonated with thousands of people around the world.

To every writer, artist, and contributor who said yes, who shared personal and insightful pieces of themselves on the page, who trusted us with their stories and their deeply personal work, thank you. Archer would not exist without your sustaining support and trust in us.

To the hundreds of artists and creatives around the globe I’ve had the immense privilege of working with and commissioning over the years, your work has continually moved and inspired me in ways I will carry for the rest of my life.

To the team… my gorgeous chosen family of collaborators. You are some of the hardest-working, most dedicated, most deeply caring people I have ever known. I have felt held by you in a way I never thought possible within a workplace. We showed up for one another on our most vulnerable days, and every single day has been a living example of what care, connection, and community can truly look like. Getting to grow alongside you for 13 years has been one of the greatest joys of my life. And to all the beautiful team members and interns who poured their time, energy, and heart into this work along the way, your contributions are woven into the fabric of Archer, and I’ve valued the ways in which Archer has grown because of you.

Lastly, to Hailey Moroney, my long-time visual collaborator, colleague, and beautiful friend. You have shown up to this work with your whole heart, every time, even on the hardest days. Thank you for saying yes all those years ago and for your immense capacity to love and deeply care about what you do. My gut said you were the human to join visual forces with from the beginning, and it was one of the best decisions of my life! You got it from here….xo

I am no longer working with Archer Magazine or Archer Studio, but the work and the people will be a part of me forever. I leave you with a little piece of the Archer’s ART issue editor’s note:

“We don’t need art now more than ever – we have always needed it. It is tethered to our global ancestry, and bound to our shared humanity in all its forms, no matter how big or small its audience.”

Live compassionately and with play and protest,

Lex

For all enquiries about Archer Magazine and Archer Studio, please email info@archermagazine.com.au.

We love you,

The Archer team.